The late Richard Feynman participated in the Manhattan Project, won the 1965 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on quantum electrodynamics, and put his natural irreverence to good use as a best-selling author who epitomized the citizen scientist. This entry, whose point reaches far beyond the realms of science, is taken from a collection of his short works entitled The Pleasure of Finding Things Out:
"I would now like to turn to a third value that science has. It is a little more indirect, but not much. The scientist has a lot of experience with ignorance and doubt and uncertainty, and this experience is of very great importance, I think. When a scientist doesn't know the answer to a problem, he ignorant. When he has a hunch as to what the result is, he is uncertain. And when he is prettydarn sure what the result is going to be, he is in some doubt. We have found it of paramount importance that in order to progress we must recognize the ignorance and leave room for doubt. Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty - some most unsure, some nearly sure, none absolutely certain.
Now, we scientists are used to this, and we take it for granted that it is perfectly consistent to be unsure - that it is possible to live and not know. But I don't know whether everyone realizes that this is true. Our freedmom to doubt was born of a struggle against authority in the early days of science. It was a very deep and strong struggle. Permit us to question - to doubt, that's all - not to be sure. And I think it is important that we do not forget the importance of this struggle and thus perhaps lose what we have gained. Here lies a responsibility to society.
....Through all ages men have tried to fathom the meaning of life. They have realized that if some direction or meaning could be given to our actions, great human forces would be unleashed. So, very many answers must have been given to the question of the meaning of it all. But they have been of all different sorts, and the proponents of one answer have looked with horror at the actions of the believers in another. Horror, because from a disagreeing point of view all the great potentialities of the race were being channeled into a false and confining blind alley. In fact, it is from the history of the enormous monstrosities created by false belief that philosophers have realized the apparently infinite and wondrous capacities of human beings. The dream is to find the open channel.
What, then, is the meaning of it all? What can we say to dispel the mystery of existence?
If we take everything into account, not only what the ancients knew, but all of what we know today that they didn't know, then I think we must frankly admit that we do not know.
But in admitting this, we have probably found the open channel.
This is not a new idea; this is the idea of the age of reason. This is the philosophy that guided the men who made the democracy that we live under. The idea that no one really knew how to run a government led to the idea that we should arrange a system by which new ideas could be developed, tried out, tossed out, more new ideas brought in; a trial and error system. This method was the result of the fact that science was already showing itself to be a successful venture at the end of the 18th century. Even then it was clear to socially minded people that the openness of the possibilities was an opportunity, and that doubt and discussion were essential t progress into the unknown. If we want to solve a problem that we have never solved before, we must leave the door to the unknown ajar."
What do you think?
The same book has an essay The Relation Of Science And Religion which I've always liked as well. Or for something more fun, which pokes fun at philosophers, there's the "Is a brick an essential object?" anecdote. (Scroll down to the "A Map of the Cat?" chapter.)
Hm, is that repeat, "So, very many answers must have been given to the question of the meaning of it all. So, very many answers must have been given to the question of the meaning of it all." in the original? If so, what is the meaning of that? ;)
His thesis is plausible, but I wonder which is chicken and which is egg. Did science get a huge boost from increasing willingness to doubt, or did willingness to doubt get a boost from science? Or is something else the root of both? Can we ever be certain?
It all sounds questionable to me . . . .
:p
Typo fixed.
Its meaning is the universal human tendency to error, which necessitates careful cultivation of "the habit of truth" and of a science that is open to disproof and values correction. :-)
Next week, we'll run an excerpt from J. Bronowski in support of his hypothesis that the values of democracy and liberty stem in part from the values necessary to science.
I wouldn't make too much over the "conflict" between religion and science. It's no coincidence that science was only developed in the West and then only several centuries into the Christian era. It's also no coincidence that Descartes was trained by Jesuits, and Newton and Locke were devout Protestants. Why didn't the Greeks, with their tradition of rationalism, or the Romans, with their tradition of pragmatism, ever develop anything resembling modern science? The difference is Christianity with its belief that God works by rule of law and created a universe that works the same way and its belief that man is created in the image of God and therefore capable of comprehending God's creation.